Everything around us, from the things we use to the things we eat can be categorized into two groups- biodegradable and non-biodegradable. Natural products like paper, vegetable peels, wool, certain plastics etc. are biodegradable products which mean they can be consumed by the microorganisms and returned to the nature. Or in simpler words we can say that bio degradable products are the ones which can decompose in a small amount of time without polluting the environment. On the other hand, products like glass, synthetic rubber and steel come under the category of non-biodegradable. These things do not get decomposed by the action of microorganisms and they stay in our environment for hundreds of years polluting our land and the whole ecosystem. …show more content…
Plastic Carry bags have contributed significantly in creating a sustainable, cost effective, energy efficient, hygienic and environmental friendly packaging system and for carrying, storing and packing various types of commodities/products including food …show more content…
They are essential for packaging of bread, confectionery items, all range of Farsan/Namkeen and bakery products in view of its superior properties and cost effectiveness. All these products are very sensitive to moisture and loose taste and quality within no time. Hygroscopic edible products like sugar, salt, jaggery and many other food items susceptible to moisture cannot be effectively packed in alternative materials without sacrificing the quality or cost of packaging. Over years plastics packaging have played a major role in protecting and increasing the shelf life of these products. For carrying fish, meat, poultry and other wet food products, plastic bags are most suitable and no other alternative packaging can substitute them. Use of Waste Plastic Bags in Road Construction through PPP (Bangalore Municipal Corporation, Karnataka)Project objective: To utilize the waste plastic bags in the bituminous mix of concrete for cost saving and improved performance of Roads through public-privatepartnership Pre project situation: Bangalore city generates nearly 15 tones of waste plastic
The article Plastic bags are Good for you, by Katherine Mangu-Ward was written to explore the pro’s and con’s of three different types of bags. Which is better between plastic, paper, or reusable bags has always been a debatable question with an opinionated answer. In the article Mangu-Ward characterizes the cause and effect relationships which have lead to the unpopularity of plastic bags in terms of guilt.
There is also debate on how much better biodegradable plastics are in the first place. This is because as biodegradable plastics break down, they break up into smaller and smaller pieces, but never quite disappear. This leaves the potential that the plastic would continue entering the food chain. But although biodegradable plastics aren’t perfect, they are still much safer than standard plastic and present a much lower risk. In addition, by making the shift to ban single use plastics, research towards better plastic alternatives will speed up and better solutions will become available. Over time, these new alternatives to plastics may spread to other items that aren’t single use, making an even greater impact on the health of humans and the
Secondly, this backpack is amazing for the environment. Every bag is created with 10 plastic bottles, giving a new life to these products that usually take over 400 years to decompose. In fact, “Between 5m and 13m tonnes of plastic leaks into the world’s oceans each
Biomass Packaging Co., et al. Plastic in the ocean does not biodegrade, it only breaks down into smaller, and smaller pieces, some pieces are so small they cannot be seen by the naked eye.... ... middle of paper ... ... 11 April 2014.
The food we consume everyday touches plastic infinitely, whether it is during the preparation stages, packaging, storage or even just eating the food from a plastic plate. There is no escaping the fact that the food we eat has a huge contact with plastics. However, what does this mean for our food? There is an adverse effect to plastics and their contact with foods, particularly acidic, fatty or salty foods. The chemicals in plastics go through a process called “leaching” or “migration” which leads to transfer of polymer additives, impurities and polymerisation solvents into packaged goods with a consequent risk of toxic hazard to the consumer (Crompton, T. (1979). [book]). In this
Our goal is to convince zoo visitors to start using reusable bags instead of plastic bags when they go shopping. Before I started volunteering to work at the bye to bags booth I already knew plastic bags were bad for the environment. However,
To begin with, 100,000 animals died from plastic bags each year. This includes dolphins, birds, whales, and endangered sea turtles that confuse them for food. Plastic ends up in the ocean and because they were design to last, the plastic just floats in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch for thousands of years. What is worst is that the rough waves and the sun’s ultraviolet ray will hit the bags and break them in to microscopic bits. Now, they are small as plankton and many fish can ingest them. This will kill the fish and animals that eat the fish if they did not die yet and this will lead to a decree in food and an increase in starvation in countries that depends on the fishing industry to survive. This illustrates just only one way on how plastic bags affect the ecosystem and then back around to us.
All of the paper-making and plastic-making could be slow to degrade. Paper can be degrade in different time due to how it was made. Usually, it takes about few months, yet it is possible that you can still find the 50-years-old newspapers in landfills.(Thomas) However, plastic takes even longer to degrade. Plastic usually don't degrade the way that paper does. Plastic will not rot like paper did and become organic stuffs that could be reuse to our environment. Furthermore, plastic will only break into small pieces and fly cross everywhere in the air. According to the article, "Plastic bags versus paper bags" Thomas mentions that "recycling a plastic bag requires 91 percent less energy than recycling a paper bag."
Well did you know you not only get paid to recycle, but the environment as a whole benefits from this as well. Today recycling is a huge deal because the Environmental Protection Agency knows that if we don't mitigate or prevent trash from entering The Great Garbage Patches, they will only increase in size and become worse. All countries recycling percentages are anywhere between “0 percent to 63 percent being the highest.” Though these percentages are better than previous years there is much more room for improvement. With the recycling percentages remaining relatively low worldwide, many scientist and engineers have worked together to create biodegradable plastic. The two different types of biodegradable plastics are bioplastics themselves and plastics that use biodegradable additives. The questions is, how does creating bioplastics help prevent pollution in the ocean? Besides the fact that bioplastics can be decomposed, it’s also made up of natural materials such as corn oil and plants, instead of petroleum based raw materials. “2.65 kg of corn is needed in order to make 1 kg of polylactic acid”, which polylactic acid is the only known acid to make compostable plastic. These bioplastics also carry less toxins and do not consist of any Bisphenol A (BPA) or any of those harsh chemical pollutants found from the micro plastics that are currently in the ocean. Unfortunately, some bioplastics cannot be broken down as
The article is about “Plastic Bag charged introduced in England”. “Plastic bags used for just a few minutes but take 1000 years to degrade”. Therefore when resources are not used efficiently, market failure arises, which is a situation in which the market does not allocate resources efficiently. Therefore plastic bags are negative externality of consumption, which is when a third party is affected by the consumption of goods and services for which no appropriate compensation is paid.
Do you hate seeing litter on the streets, or seeing and smelling heaps of garbage sitting, and rotting away? Humans recycling more will help to reduce this. We throw many things that can be recycled. Recycling glass, plastics, paper, and metals will reduce solid waste dumped into the ecosystem daily. “96 percent of U.S. plastic, and 50 percent of its paper, goes into landfills. Mexico, not exactly a bastion of environmental awareness, recycles more glass than the U.S.” (Alice Horrigan 1). That’s 96 percent of the millions of tons of plastic, which will outlive most of us in a landfill that we could recycle and keep it out of our landfill. Paper is made from trees, if we recycle it, we can decrease our rate of ugly deforestation and the destruction of animal habitats. When paper gets to the landfill, it is guaranteed to get wet. The wetness and decomposition of paper atracts mold spores, which produce an odor and are potentially bad for your health. Also k...
Using plastic bags are second nature to people in this day and age. Warner acknowledges, “Much to the dismay of the environmentally conscious citizens worldwide, the ubiquity of the free plastic carryout bag has bred nonchalant consumers who take this modern convenience for granted” (646). Although some people are conscious about the environment, people strive more for convenience and do not think about the impacts using bags have not only on the environment, but on themselves as well. If something is bad for the environment, it will alternatively be bad for humans as well. When plastic bags are exposed to the sun from being littered all around, the ultraviolet rays cause the substances of plastic bags to weaken. After the substances weaken, the substances become invisible to the naked eye. The substances that are no longer able to be seen are toxic to humans (Warner 649). As a result of plastic bags being littered around, animals consume plastic bags. This is negatively affects humans because animals are often consumed. When humans consume animals like, fish, there can be plastic in the fish’s belly, which then transfers to the humans and this poses a concern for human’s health. Humans are negatively affected by plastic bags because of the toxic chemicals in plastic bags, as well as, consuming animals with plastic in their
Synthetic plastics are used widely in food packaging, detergents, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and other chemicals’ packaging. Almost 30% of the synthetic plastics are used for packaging applications in the world and this rate is expanding at 12% per annum. They have replaced traditionally used papers and cellulose products for packaging purposes because of owing better physical and chemical properties. Polyethylene, polypropylene, polystyrene, polyvinyl chloride, polyurethane, poly(ethylene terephthalate), poly(butylene terephthalate) and nylon are most commonly used plastics. Plastics possess not only suitable thermal and mechanical properties but also better stability and durability. Plastics have attractive more public and media attention because of its durability and visibility in a litter as compared to other solid components. In 1993, total world consumption of this material was 107 million tons and it reached to 146 million tons in
This essay will discuss the various harmful effects of plastic bags, and demonstrate the risks that these bags impose on humans, animals, and the environment. It will also discuss a series of suggested solutions that could help reduce plastic bag usage. Although plastic bags appear to be fragile and light, their negative environmental effect is devastating. Plastic bags may cause large amounts of pollution at every step of their limited life cycle, from the extraction of raw materials, production, transportation, and recycling or disposal. Plastic bags can be defined as the most damaging form of environmental pollution.
Plastic packaging is a major source of waste and is regularly ingested by various marine and land animals with fatal consequences aswell as in comparison to biodegradable materials, synthetic plastic will sit and rot in landfills and oceans where it will continue to pollute the environment.